(a) Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a microfluidic system. More particularly, the present invention relates to a pump and pumping system for a microfluidic lab-on-a-chip and a fabricating method thereof.
(b) Description of the Related Art
Recently, microfluidic systems such as a lab-on-a-chip and micro total analysis system are being researched and developed at a good pace. A pump for flowing fluid is essential to perform an experiment and analysis using microfluidic systems.
Macro-scale pumps that are externally installed, for instance a syringe pump, are frequently utilized in a pressure driven flow in microfluidic systems, and researches on these are being industriously performed. The syringe pumps are able to control extremely small and accurate amounts of fluid at a time, however, they are generally limited in use due to their size and high cost.
In this regard, various types of micropumps that are integrated directly into the microfluidic systems have been developed. But previous micropumps that are directly coupled to the microfluidic system make the systems complex to fabricate and difficult to operate, even though they might control a micro-fluid using piezoelectricity, static electricity, thermo-pneumatics, magnetism, etc.
The above information disclosed in this Background section is only for enhancement of understanding of the background of the invention and therefore it may contain information that does not form the prior art that is already known in this country to a person of ordinary skill in the art.